Obsession
by DMitchell
Summary: Hermione has fallen deeper into her obsession with Professor Snape. Will this lead her to the forbidden relationship she craves, or the broken heart that seems inevitable? -COMPLETE-
1. Breathe

**Story Title:** Obsession  
**Chapter Title:** Breathe (1/3)  
**Author:** DMitchell1985  
**Beta:** Peggy  
**Story Rating/Chapter Rating:** PG-13 - that's about as high as it looks like it will get/PG - slight mention of moans and bare skin  
**Story** **Genre:** Alternate Universe, First-person (is that a genre?), Romance (?), Angst  
**Disclaimer:** I don't own _Harry Potter_, so forth and so on.  
**Archiving/Feedback:** Both are appreciated. I must know where the story is headed, and feedback should be construct in same fashion.  
**Warnings:** The little tidbit about the moans  
**Pairings:** Hermione Granger/Severus Snape, Severus Snape/Catherine Sullivan  
**Website: **http: groups . yahoo . com / group / isurvivedacelebrityobsession (sans the spaces and add the two forward spaces (/) after the the http: bit)  
**Email:** betagirl23 at yahoo dot com  
**Author's Notes:** This is the continuation of the vignette called, "Shadow". This short, chaptered story further explores my Hermione's crush on Professor Snape. A few questions such as what happens and whether she gets him will be answered here. Also, I made Hermione a Ravenclaw. I love that House the best, (colors, intelligence, pick one) so, I decided to make her a Ravenclaw in this story. This story was posted before, but the original account had trouble, and I had to repost. I hope that you enjoy the story anyway.  
  
**-**  
  
I can't breathe. He's just passed me again. He's stopped and brought his hand down on the table in front of me with enough force to shake the heavy wooden table, and effectively slosh a portion of the contents of every cauldron onto the table. I hear him shout my name to gain my attention. My eyes focus, but I draw back into myself. He cannot see the thoughts that lie there. The bare skin, sweat, and groans. He cannot.  
  
I slowly raise my gaze to meet his, "Yes, Professor?"  
  
"I would hope that a potion which demands specific ingredients to be added at the precise moment would garner more than distant apathy from you. It seems that I am incorrect in this assumption. Perhaps, you wish to inform everyone as to what could _possibly_ capture your enthrallment where today's lesson has obviously failed?"  
  
I clear my throat and attempt to sound unnerved, "No, thank you, Professor. I have already added the necessary items, and was simply waiting the last five minutes required until I added the last one needed in order to complete the potion."  
  
"Ah. So, is this why I watched your cauldron nearly bubble over ten minutes ago? If you had bothered to even look at your project, you would have noticed this too."  
  
The class chuckled and exchanged glances at the unlikely amateur error made by one of the known brilliant minds of Hogwarts.  
  
"You will learn to control your mind's future wanderings," he continued, as though he hadn't heard the snickering, "Twenty-five points from Ravenclaw. And you, you will see me in my office at 7 P.M. for detention."  
  
I almost open my mouth to protest, but think better of it, and chock back the whined reply which ached to be voiced. _He_ does not like whiners. "Yes sir, Professor," I answer aloud, calmly. "I will be there," I think to myself deviously, "I will be there indeed."  
  
**-  
  
TBC  
  
**


	2. Puncuality

**Chapter Title:** Puncuality (2/3)

**Chapter Rating:** PG - for a brief extreme masochist thought

**Warnings:** None really, except that thought.

**Author's Note:** I know that this chapter might seem a tiny bit dark in a couple of sentences, but I needed to set the tone of Hermione's total surrender to her obsession with someone that she should not desire.

**-**

Here I stand, desparately hoping that I drip of the same sensuality that seems to premeate damn near every woman I know, instead of the twisting anxiety that I feel gnaw at me. I inhale deeply, and lift my hand to the solid red oak door that separates the broody professor from the rest of the world. I release the fragile breath and rap my tense knuckles against the wood.  
  
One breath, in, out.  
  
Two breathes, I think I'm dying.  
  
Three breathes, footsteps.  
  
I hear a grandfather clock gong my puncuality to the empty air. _He_ appreciates precision.  
  
Before the seventh gong is complete, he has opened the door and lifted a dark brow, accessing me.  
  
I feel his regard creep into the confines of my consciousness, and I fight the impulse to openly twinge, "Hello, Professor."  
  
"Miss Granger," he acknowledges me cooly with every bit of even assurance that I cannot quite posess.  
  
He turns then, and saunters to the large desk at the back of the room, which complimented the door, floor paneling, and every piece of furniture that decorates the spacious office, red oak, all of it. He stops in the center of the open space, and I suppress a minute gasp of shock.   
  
I expected dead things, potion ingredients, and macabre books detailing horrendous tortures to be strewn about. The alluring room held none of these. Instead of dark tomes, the bookselves held classical literature. In lieu of prized animal carasses filling the walls, paintings that display splashes of paint whose hues run into shades rivaling my life's blood, and lovers entangled in a tantric embrace devours the office's horizontal space.  
  
_This_ man, made certain to reflect the smoldering heat I knew lay within the ill-tempered Professor into his surroundings. I was lost on this realisation alone.  
  
This was not the man the other students, especially the bitter, hissing girls, teased me about in the Common Room as I prepared to come here tonight. I don't care if he does as they say he will, and harms me beyond recognition. I want him to. Then, at least, he will have _touched_ me.  
  
Belatedly, I realize that he that he had begun listing my duties for the night.  
  
". . . and I want you to _cleanse_ my tools throughly. I expect there to be no trace of anything after you have concluded your tasks. The last thing I need is a bottle or a cauldron to explode whilst I am trying to get some work accomplished. Do you understand?"  
  
"Yes, Professor," I clear my throat and brace myself for the impending onslaught, "Professor, I wanted to be certain of all my tasks before I begin. You have assigned me to clean your potion bottles and cauldrons. Is there anything else?"  
  
He whirls to face me, wearing an infamous look of comtemptful disatisfaction, "You simple-minded child, haven't you made any effort to listen to a word that I have spoken? I don't know why I even waste my breath on you, as your mind never seems to be in residence of your body."  
  
He scoffs and storms to his desk, "You will dust and straighten the bookselves, dust the furniture, and go into my laboratory through_ that_ door, and clean the potion supplies. Are we clear?"  
  
My eyes follow the end of finger which pointed to a door I hadn't notice upon entering the room. I swallow my ego and reply, "Transparent."  
  
I silently scold myself for allowing me to believe that I could reach beyond my limits, in hopes of acquiring what I could never have. "Silly girl," I chide myself, "Stupid girl." I bite the inside of my cheek. "Seven Year or no, he would never have you," a cruel voice whispers to me.  
  
"You may get to work now."  
  
I nod dumbly, sampling the tears that are collecting behind my eyes as I look away at a far wall, "Of course, Professor."  
**  
-  
  
TBC  
  
**


	3. Ethic

**Story Title: **Obsession

**Chapter Title: **Ethic (3/3)

**Chapter Rating: **PG-13 - for cursing on Hermione's part, the girl has quite a mouth, and mind, on her in this story.

**Author's Notes: **Well, it's over. Not a long journey, but one nevertheless. I have decided to write a sequel to this short story. I definitely liked the set up this story will provide me for the second part. The first chapter of that should be posted in the next couple of weeks, I hope. Thanks to everyone who reviewed "Obsession" on it's original posting. Also, I noticed that I did not use Severus' name anywhere through out the story, not even his last name. I amended that in this chapter. I used his last name once to make Hermione's point. I hope that this story was enjoyed by all. -Danielle

**-**

I blow out another huff of irritation. How dare he do this to me? I glaze over one time, now, I somehow deserve to scrub cauldrons and dust old bookselves.  
  
_"That wasn't the first time you've allowed your mind to venture into the field of forbidden thought. . ."  
  
_I pause, "Where did that thought come from?"  
  
_"It's true. You can't keep your attention focused solely on your Potions assignments in **his **class, can you?"_ the voice riduculed.  
  
"No," I reply aloud. My fingers shoot up to my lips to pull the word back in. He cannot hear me talking to myself. He'll think I've lost my mind. He already believes me to be an imbecile, he does not need further cause to question my intelligence.  
  
"No what, Miss Granger?" a sultry drawl inquires from the adjacent study.  
  
Dammit! I lightly smack my forehead, "Nothing Professor."  
  
"Then perhaps, you should keep your idle utterances to yourself. Are you finished yet?" he asks impatiently.  
  
"Not yet, almost. I am working on the last cauldron," I answer.  
  
I hear him sigh heavily, "Well please put a bit more effort into hurrying. I do have other things to do besides punishing you. If you had been more attentive to your cauldron, and had not been wasteful in the process, we would not be here. What exactly is "almost"?"  
  
"I've just begun the last cauldron. After that, I'm done."  
  
I hear him sigh again, " And how long do you believe it will take you to finish?"  
  
"10, maybe 20 minutes. The leftover potion is quite sticky. Most of it has hardened already. I think it is," I breathe in the odor of the grubby cauldron, "Actually, I don't know what it is. I'll clean it up though."  
  
I stop and wonder if I sound like a ninny babbling on. I decide that I will sound that way to him no matter what I am saying.  
  
The legs of the sturdy desk chair scrapes against the floor. I am sure that he has charmed them not to scratch his precious floor. _He_ would not like his perfection ruined.  
  
I can hardly distinguish the light sound of his footsteps from the quiet, soothing swish of his teaching robes. My heart climbs out of my chest to knock against my teeth when I realize that he's entered the laboratory. I can feel his inky eyes on me, calculating, always, calculating.  
  
"Bring the last cauldrom to me MIss Granger," he commands in a hushed, resigned tone, "I will take care of it."  
  
I squeeze my eyes shut and keep my back to him. "Breathe," I think to myself. My hands move to support the large cauldron on either side of its substanial width. I stiffen my muscles, and heft the cast iron monstrosity into the air. I wimper at its weight, and square my shoulders to steady myself.  
  
"Are you able to carry it," he interupts my valiant efforts.  
  
I grunt in response, managing to choke out a meek "No."  
  
"All right then. Set it back down. I'll take care of it there."  
  
I drop the weighty cauldron back on the tabletop, none to gently, and he waltzs around me, frowning, "Do try to be more careful Miss Granger. You could have damaged my cauldron."  
  
I glare up at him. I nearly have a bloody stroke attempting to pick up something that weighs more than a small child, and all he can think of is his pot???  
  
"And yourself, of course," he adds indulgently.  
  
I force my teeth into a grin, gripping the table's edge to stave the release of any sarcastic comments. "Of course," I coo in return, gritting my teeth slightly.  
  
At least I can say that I have spent time alone with him, away from the curious students and staff. I can say that for a heartbeat, he saw only me, even if he was in a mood, and insulting me. For a brief moment, he was truly mine, though he may not know it.  
  
A smooth wave of his hand revealed his wand from the inner left pocket of his outer robe. "Stand aside," he orders.  
  
I obey immediately, sliding over a few steps to give him direct access to the cauldron in question.  
  
He draws the wand through the air, creating dazzling trails of of blue, yellow, and green. A misty fog forms, descending upon the cauldron after glimmering a few more moments in the open air.  
  
My ears register a nearly inaudible gasp of amazement and wonder at the beauty of the scene before me, I then recognize the voice as my own, flushing instantly.  
  
He looks over at me, smirking smugly. Damn him.  
  
"I take it, you're impressed?"  
  
"I. . .um, well, yes. I suppose," I sniff noncommittally to try and salvage my thin appearance of nonchalance, to no avail. He already knew the truth.  
  
He smirks again and looks into the cauldron to survey his work. I peer in too, to have a look for myself.  
  
No trace of the thick, sticky substance remained in the pot. "Hrmm, well done," I offer.  
  
He glances at me, sneering, "Indeed. Since the last task is complete, you may go now. Learn to stay focused in class from now on."  
  
I nod and walk toward the doorway leading to the office. I stop short when I hear the office's outer door open.  
  
"Severus?" a female voice calls out, "I thought we were going to meet for drinks in Hogsmeade. Severus?"  
  
"In here," he replies behind me.  
  
I flick my eyes back over my shoulder, and to the doorway in front of me to see a blonde goddess stroll through.  
  
"Oh hello," the goddess says to me. "Severus," she mumured seductively. She walks to him, past me, as if I am nothing, pulling him into her arms before anointing his parted lips with a demure kiss. She kindly glances back at me, not yet releasing her prize, "I don't believe we've met. I'm Catherine. Catherine Sullivan."  
  
He coughs to clear his throat, "Miss Granger, this is my finacee."  
  
I know that I am staring, I try to soften my gaze, but my eyes refuse to cooperate. "Hi," I mutter.  
  
"It's always nice to meet Severus' students," the blonde informs me, pressing her pouting lips against his pale, right cheek. "You are a student, aren't you?"  
  
Before I can answer, she goes on, snaring the attention meant for me, "By the coloring of that tie, I'd say you were a Ravenclaw. Am I correct?" She peers up at her finacee innocently, as if on cue.  
  
"You are correct Catherine," he assures her. "You may go now, MIss Granger."  
  
I sniff once more, turning on my low, stacked heels, exiting with as much grace that I can muster through my fog of anger. _Finacee?!? _He's mine!  
  
I reach for the cool steel of the office's outer door knob. His words to her float to me, "I must apologize Sweetheart. I had work to do. It slipped my mind to owl you. Allow me to make it up to you. My tongue, has been in great need of, exercise."  
  
I do not miss the obvious suggestio in his offer, nor do I miss the high-pitched giggle the flaxen doll emits. Bitch.  
  
I snatch the door open, walk through, and slam it shut as hard as I can on their lust. I know that he will wish to speak with me tomorrow, but I don't care. I'll simply undress him with my mind as I always do.  
  
I chuckle to myself, and scowl at the group of Third Year Slytherin students eyeing me as I stomp down the hallway.  
  
"Oh yes," I vow silently, "Slytherin shall have a new Mrs. Head of House, and it won't be a twit named Catherine. I shall have him if it means that the most _unfortunate_ accident happens to one Miss Catherine Sullivan, or my name isn't Hermione Granger. . . -Snape.  
  
-**  
  
The End  
  
**


End file.
